But now alter the situation just a little bit. Replace your son or daughter with a co-worker
at your place of employment. And instead
of this being a one time near accidental event, make it one that happens
without any acknowledgement and from time to time. In effect, there is an office thief. Not someone who would have the courage to ask
you for food or for help, but someone who instead takes whatever they want, no
matter how clearly it is labeled, and makes no apology seeking first above all
to never be caught. Now instead of
family, you face someone who is nowhere near as close to you. Now instead of one lunch you may have been
victim to losing several. Now instead of
someone who has accidentally wronged you, you have someone who knows they did,
and has not cared, that is, until they are caught doing it. Is your forgiveness still as instant? Is it still as complete? Is this still a funny story you tell in the
future to come, or has it lost all ability to be humorous as the one who hurts
you cares very little that they did hurt you and likely only wants to avoid any
painful consequences. As Christians we
are bound to still offer forgiveness.
But as humans how we feel about this slightly altered scenario might be
quite a bit different. At the end of the
day we may still get over it, get past it.
But there is a certain part of us that would not mind seeing a little
“justice” doled out with the forgiveness we offer. A little just retribution, not severe mind
you, as this was not a severe crime, but at least some form of cosmic karma, to
the perpetrator who seems to care less about what they did.
Aren’t Christians supposed to be free from the need to
pursue justice when forgiveness is our calling card. Especially in light of the forgiveness we are
shown by God when we sin in much the same manner. Then let us examine the most severe case of
something like this. What happens when
again the perpetrator is not family, but the crime is one that cannot be
undone, and robs you of something you can never have again. Perhaps they have taken the life of someone
you love, or the fidelity of someone who vowed never to lose that to another. Lives lost cannot be replaced. Vows broken will always be broken. And how the perpetrator feels about
committing these crimes may be as sorry as the child who once stole your
sandwich, or as callous as the office thief who tries to do it regularly. Again as Christians we are bound to offer
forgiveness. But as humans, our pain
drives us to want justice all the more. So
we rationalize our forgiveness in a case like this. We can “forgive” but not “forget”. We can try to move on, but with a hole in our
hearts that can never be undone. New
lives albeit damaged lives.
And comes the riddle of emotional quandaries our hearts are
unable to solve. I have wronged a great
many people over the course of my life.
And to an incident, and a person, I regret each one. I carry a burden inside myself that no one
else can see, of a sorrow for causing the pain I know I have caused. If I could undo any one of these actions, or
all of them, I would choose to undo them.
But that repentance comes only from Jesus who teaches me to not only
want repentance, but to feel it, to understand that my evil causes pain like
ripples in a quiet pond where a large stone is dropped. At the time I may have chosen to be blind to
my crimes, but in retrospect I feel them all keenly. And there have been a great many people who
have wronged me over my life. But again
in retrospect none of what they did to me matters, or is remembered as
important, save two. Two brothers who
took from me, and more importantly from ones I deeply love, that which cannot
be replaced or undone. They have always
remained incalcitrant. And despite best
efforts, my forgiveness has always been nested in feelings of a desire for
retribution, sometimes as bad as an ultimate retribution. And it would seem my Christianity stumbles in
this regard.
I know I am supposed to get past it, like every other wrong
or slight I cannot so much as remember or even think about in detail anymore. But this pain is not isolated to me. It infects those I love and I am victim of
it, but also made to watch the suffering it causes in my closest circle. Ripples of someone else’s stone thrown
carelessly and by intent into the quiet pool of my life. And so I have vacillated between trying hard
to offer a real forgiveness, and trying harder not to take an ill-conceived
vengeance of my own. As if any amends I
could force might make any difference at all; short making it all worse. But God says vengeance belongs to Him. I am content with that. But must take my heart to Him, to lose the
desire to see Him find vengeance on those who have caused so much pain in my
world. And in all of this I find it is
not the intellectual mysteries or riddles of the world that confound me and
plague me. It is and has always been the
emotional ones. Then to see something I
do not know how to even describe.
This week I learned that both brothers who I have contended in
my heart with for so long have fallen to covid 19. One is dead, after suffering for a very long
time. The other is in critical condition,
also have suffered for a very long time, and his prognosis is the same as his
brother. And what is my first thought? I should not speak it. I should not think it. The one is gone, my next hurtle is to not
only forgive, but to learn to become neighbors in the kingdom of heaven no matter
our past. But that he is gone, I find
myself not regretting. And I know it is
wrong. The other is still not lost to
the power of prayer. But do I have the
courage to offer a prayer for his recovery?
His crimes against my family are not the kind of crimes that limit
themselves to only a singular victim, they tend to spread like cancer in the
darkness across a wide number of families like mine. If we pray him back, do we open pandora’s box
of pain on other families for the remainder of his life on this world? I have spent so long trying to forgive. But now God offers me the chance to not only
forgive, but to put aside my judgment, my fears, and be the Christian I am
meant to be. To trust God with his
redemption, even if I am never made privy to it.
A riddle of my heart I cannot solve, or even understand. But as always, my wife helps me through this
quagmire and offers her own example of what to pray; not just for his physical
recovery, but for his redemptive one, no matter his incalcitrance to this point
in time. And I find myself following her
lead. And I find myself entrusting my
heart and my feelings to Jesus, asking not to solve the riddle of how I think
or feel, or should feel. Only that Jesus
might alter my heart into the heart He wishes to make within me. An altered heart, will find a better way to
love, a more Christlike way to forgive, and a supreme interest in the
redemption of those who wronged me, not in their torture, or death. I should long for their company in heaven,
not consign them to the fate I deserve in this life or the next. And only Jesus can solve that riddle of how I
feel, or think, or how I should feel.
It is when we think we know it all that God reminds us, we
do not. It is when we think we have
perfect control of our feelings, that God reminds us our feelings should never
be relied upon for anything. For our
minds are as dirty as our hearts and consequently our souls are. And there is only One Jesus who offers to
clean both mind and heart, and renew the soul within us. So should I ever come to believe that I know
it all, even in the confines of a single doctrine of my faith, I will have
fallen into error. For only Jesus knows
it all. Only Jesus truly understands all
Truth. I catch only mere glimpses of
that Truth from time to time when I am not forcing my eyes shut, pretending all
riddles are subject to my failing intellect that never knew it all in the first
place. Perhaps there are some riddles I
am not meant to understand, because I meant to rely on Jesus and nothing about
me to get past them.
Luke records Jesus offering a riddle to the proud members of
the Sanhedrin trying to trap Jesus in a trick question. Jesus simply uses their own traditions and
incorrect beliefs to create a riddle none of them would be able to solve. At least, not without discarding the error of
their beliefs, and coming to see Jesus for what He truly is, their Messiah and
ours. Luke picks up this snippet at the
end of the 20th chapter of his gospel letter to his friend about
what we believe and why. It begins in
verse 41 saying … “And he said unto them, How
say they that Christ is David's son? [verse 42] And
David himself saith in the book of Psalms, The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou
on my right hand, [verse 43] Till I make thine
enemies thy footstool. [verse 44] David
therefore calleth him Lord, how is he then his son?” It was Jewish tradition that fathers would
earn more respectable titles than sons.
And it was well known that the Messiah would be of the bloodline of
David. So the quandary Jesus proposes is
that Christ was alive before David, and yet alive in the bloodline of David at
the same time. The Christ then, was the
Son of God, not just a mortal Messiah, or mortal prophet as the people liked to
see Him. For He existed both before
David and after him.
The leaders had no way to reconcile this without admitting
that their understanding was not as complete as they thought. And by the way, that Jesus may well be both
the Messiah and the Son of God. But it
was not just the minds of these leaders that were in error. Their hearts were as well. Jesus continues with a warning about where
their think had led them. Luke picks
back up in verse 45 saying … “Then in the audience of all the people he said unto his
disciples, [verse 46] Beware of the scribes,
which desire to walk in long robes, and love greetings in the markets, and the
highest seats in the synagogues, and the chief rooms at feasts; [verse 47] Which devour widows' houses, and for a shew make long
prayers: the same shall receive greater damnation.” A pride in thinking they knew everything
there was to know about scripture, had not increased their love for
others. It had nearly extinguished it. Along with the conscience a true believer
should have been haunted by if nothing else.
For these leaders had come to devour the homes of widow. To take these homes, cast the widow out on to
the street, and think nothing of her fate, or her condition. If she died, she died. That was nothing to them.
And I find my first responses may be no better than they. I hear of the news of a brother who wronged
me dying of covid and my ugly first unfiltered thought was “good”. In that instant it was me who did not think
of the widow he leaves behind, or the children who have just lost a
father. I only think of the threat he
once posed to me, the pain he caused that cannot be undone, and that now
somehow “justice” has finally been served.
And in that instant I am as wrong as the scribes in the days of Christ. I repent of my first thought. And I offer sincere prayers for the
family. I am ashamed of my reaction, and
must now add it to the list of burdens I carry.
And while I know Jesus has forgiven me my entire list, I also know the
pain I have caused can no more be undone than the pain this poor soul caused
me. This is not the vengeance of
God. Covid is not His instrument of
judgment upon the wicked. It is only a
pestilence that both righteous and wicked suffer from alike. The one difference, those who seek Jesus find
Him. Those who refuse to seek Jesus, do
not.
If there is to be a vengeance of God it must come at the end
of all things on those who refused to forsake evil for the re-creation Jesus
would have made of them. But while there
is life there is hope. And I must trust
my own salvation to Jesus to complete, as the events of this week have taught
me, it is not complete as yet. The
leaders of the Sanhedrin could not solve the riddle Jesus posed because they
clung to errant thoughts they were unwilling to let go of. Are we any better? Do you find yourself stumped by the riddles
of scripture, or a set of feeling you know in your heart you should not
have? There is only one solution to
either situation. Seek Jesus, allow Him
to change how you think, how you love, perhaps even who you love. And your mind and heart will become one with
His, focused above all else on the redemption of the lost, not the punishing of
them. Think about it. Even the warning Jesus made above was not
offered as a final condemnation, but instead as a warning, of what happens when
we refuse to yield and refuse to see.
Some riddles I am content to not know the answers to. For example, how on earth will Jesus ever
save someone in such need as me? But I
am also content to trust that despite my inability to figure out how Jesus will
ever save me, Jesus will save me, because He knows how, and I intend to let
Him. Perhaps the riddles of your life
are just as easily solved as that. Give
Jesus a try and see.
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